Chapter 4 - The Bride Who Wasn’t Running AwayVictoria was alive.
For the next six hours, that was the only good news.
Police analyzed the photograph.
No usable metadata.
No visible windows.
Concrete wall.
Metal chair.
Clock.
Nothing identifiable.
Beck refused to sit still.
Genevieve understood.
When fear has nowhere to go, it becomes motion.
They returned to the Vale estate just before midnight under police escort.
The mansion sat thirty miles outside Manhattan behind stone walls and iron gates.
Genevieve had expected opulence.
She hadn’t expected sadness.
Portraits watched from paneled walls.
Generations of Vales.
People who seemed born knowing where they belonged.
Genevieve wondered how many knew what had really happened eighteen years ago.
Evelyn waited in the library.
“You brought her here?”
Her disgust could have peeled paint.
Beck shut the door.
“We found Daniel Hart’s records.”
Evelyn went pale.
Genevieve noticed.
Beck did too.
“What did Daniel tell you?” Evelyn asked.
Interesting.
Not what did you find.
What did Daniel tell you.
Beck stepped closer.
“Why did Nathan Rowan instruct Daniel to give you Henry’s watch if Henry died?”
Evelyn sat down.
For the first time since Genevieve met her, she looked old.
“He shouldn’t have written that.”
“Answer me.”
Evelyn poured herself brandy.
Her hand shook.
“Your grandfather knew someone was stealing from the company.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Try harder.”
“He suspected internal accounts were being used to move money. Nathan helped him gather documentation.”
“Why Nathan?”
“Because Henry trusted him.”
Genevieve asked, “And my father?”
Evelyn looked at her.
“Daniel was supposed to hide the documents inside the watch.”
The room went silent.
Genevieve’s chest tightened.
“So my father knew.”
“He knew enough.”
“Enough for what?”
“Enough to become frightened.”
Evelyn drank.
“Henry intended to confront whoever was stealing. The night before he planned to do it, he collapsed.”
“At 4:17,” Genevieve said.
Evelyn looked sharply at her.
“You know.”
“My father’s watch stopped at the same time.”
Evelyn closed her eyes.
“Daniel was there.”
Genevieve stopped breathing.
“What?”
“At the hospital.”
“No.”
“He brought Henry’s watch.”
Genevieve’s voice cracked.
“My father never told me.”
“He promised Nathan he wouldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because Nathan believed Henry had been poisoned.”
Silence swallowed the room.
Beck’s face hardened.
“Poisoned by whom?”
“We never proved it.”
“You let everyone call it a heart attack.”
“We had no choice.”
“You always have a choice.”
Evelyn slammed her glass down.
“You were a child!”
Beck froze.
Genevieve noticed the wording.
Not you were young.
A child.
Like something more complicated hid beneath it.
Evelyn continued.
“Henry was dead. Nathan was terrified. Daniel had a daughter. We didn’t know whom to trust.”
“And the watch?”
“Daniel disappeared with it.”
Genevieve stared.
“You accused me tonight because you thought he gave it to me.”
Evelyn looked away.
There it was.
The truth.
“Yes.”
Genevieve laughed bitterly.
“So you threw me onto a floor in front of two hundred people.”
“I thought you had it.”
“You could have asked.”
“Would you have answered?”
Genevieve wanted to hit her.
Instead she said, “You had eighteen years to find my father.”
“I did find him.”
The room changed.
Genevieve whispered, “What?”
Evelyn’s eyes filled with something that looked suspiciously like guilt.
“Seven years ago.”
The year Daniel died.
Genevieve stepped forward.
“What happened?”
“We talked.”
“About?”
“The watch.”
“And?”
“He refused to tell me where it was.”
Genevieve’s heartbeat thundered.
“My father died three days later.”
Evelyn’s face drained.
“I had nothing to do with that.”
“Convenient.”
“It’s true.”
Beck stepped between them.
“Enough.”
Genevieve’s phone rang.
Unknown number.
Everyone froze.
She answered.
“Hello?”
Static.
Then Victoria’s voice.
“Genevieve?”
Beck lunged closer.
“Victoria!”
“Don’t—”
A muffled sound.
Then Victoria whispered urgently.
“Don’t trust Elias.”
The line went dead.
Beck immediately called Ortiz.
Genevieve stared at the phone.
Elias.
The CFO.
Nathan Rowan’s son.
The beneficiary of the secret account.
It fit.
Almost too neatly.
Within twenty minutes, police were searching Elias Rowan’s apartment.
Empty.
His car was gone.
His office had been cleared hours earlier.
On his desk they found shredded documents.
And a wedding security access card.
Beck looked grim.
“He did it.”
Genevieve wasn’t convinced.
“Maybe.”
“You heard Victoria.”
“I heard her say don’t trust Elias.”
“That’s fairly clear.”
“No. ‘Elias kidnapped me’ would be clear.”
Beck stared.
“You think she was warning us about something else?”
“I think whoever planned all this has been ahead of us every step.”
Before Beck could respond, Evelyn said quietly, “Genevieve is right.”
Both looked at her.
Evelyn stood.
“Elias knew about the old investigation.”
“Why?” Beck demanded.
“Because Nathan told him before he died.”
“So?”
“So if Elias wanted the watch, he’s had ten years to find it.”
Genevieve felt a chill.
“But tonight suddenly everything explodes.”
Exactly.
Why tonight?
Why the wedding?
Why frame Genevieve?
Because someone knew she would be there.
Someone knew Beck would be there.
Someone wanted the old secret reopened.
Or wanted everyone chasing the wrong person while something else happened.
Genevieve’s mind jumped backward.
Victoria hiring her.
Specifically her.
Not another antique specialist.
Her.
“She brought me here.”
Beck frowned.
“Who?”
“Victoria.”
The silence afterward was brutal.
Genevieve continued.
“She knew who my father was.”
“No.”
“How else did I end up at this wedding?”
“She said you came recommended.”
“By whom?”
Beck couldn’t answer.
Genevieve grabbed her phone and searched old emails.
Victoria’s assistant had contacted her six weeks earlier.
Genevieve opened the original message.
Referral: V.A.
She had assumed it meant Victoria Ashford.
Now she wasn’t sure.
Beck suddenly said, “There’s something you need to see.”
He led her upstairs.
Into Victoria’s private office.
A locked drawer had been opened by police earlier.
Inside were photocopies of newspaper clippings about Henry Vale’s death.
Daniel Hart’s obituary.
Nathan Rowan’s obituary.
And a photograph of Genevieve leaving her father’s funeral seven years ago.
Genevieve sat down.
“She was investigating us.”
Beck looked devastated.
“My fiancée knew all of this.”
A letter rested beneath the photographs.
Beck opened it.
His eyes moved rapidly across the page.
“What?”
He handed it to Genevieve.
The letter was addressed to Victoria.
Elias’s handwriting.
I found what your mother hid.
Henry wasn’t trying to protect the company.
He was trying to protect Beck.
Meet me before the wedding.
Come alone.
Genevieve looked up.
“Victoria went willingly.”
“At first.”
“Yes.”
“But someone still has her.”
Before Beck answered, a crash came from downstairs.
Then shouting.
Genevieve moved toward the hallway.
A masked man came through the side door.
Fast.
He grabbed her before she could scream.
A cloth pressed against her mouth.
Beck shouted her name.
Genevieve kicked backward.
Connected with a shin.
The man cursed.
She twisted.
Saw a familiar ring on his hand.
Black stone.
Silver crest.
She had seen it earlier that night.
On one of Beck’s relatives.
Then darkness swallowed her.
When Genevieve woke, her wrists were tied.
Concrete beneath her.
A metal chair nearby.
And across the room—
Victoria.
Alive.
Bruised.
Terrified.
Genevieve whispered, “Who did this?”
Victoria looked toward the locked door.
Then back at Genevieve.
Tears filled her eyes.
“You’re asking the wrong question.”
“What’s the right one?”
May you like
Victoria swallowed.
“Why did Beck’s father pay your father to keep Beck’s real identity secret?”
